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 The search for truth has always been the goal of every religion in the world.
Although Yoga is not a religion, its purpose is the same, and it is achieved by controlling body and mind.
This control is obtained through the everyday practice of a set of different positions (or asanas), as well as breathing exercises and meditation. These are the exercises on which we will center our articles, leaving Yoga aside as our final goal, and going back to it later on, first recommending a Yoga instructor to those who want to practice this wonderful discipline in greater depth.
There are several types of Yoga: Hatha Yoga, Mantra Yoga, Kundalini Yoga, Raja Yoga, Karma Yoga..., each of them with a definite purpose; but we will only deal with Hatha Yoga, the most Western type of Yoga.
 Hatha Yoga is also called the Yoga of postures, and these can be dynamic (for the entertainment of the body and the development of the will) or static (where we find the posture for meditation). The etymology of the word is as follows: Ha (Sun, positive, physical aspect), and Tha (Moon, negative, mental aspect) is the union of the positive and negative aspects of human beings for maintaining or restoring physical and mental balance.
According to Hatha Yoga, disease always comes from an imbalance in the circulation of our inner energy (Prana).
By practicing Yoga postures, breathing and meditation, we will be able to restore or maintain this balance and also increase our vital energy and close the door to diseases or, in case they are already present, we can reduce or even eliminate them.
Three of the Yoga components are highlighted below:
1. Breathing
2. Postures.
3. Meditation
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Through them we can improve health, vitality, flexibility strength and concentration, as well as balance and many more aspects.
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l. Breathing:
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Breathing is life.
This sentence summarizes by itself the characteristic of indispensable in the act of breathing, not only in what regards Yoga, but for life itself.
If we breathe right, we will be able to live well, if we breathe the wrong way, we will not live well.
The negative situations we live throughout our life (stress, anguish, anger) tend to accelerate our breathing and to reduce the volume of air we breathe.
By practicing Yoga, we learn to breathe in the right way, to make our breathing regular and to control it, and this enables us to get rid of stress and increase our energy.
Yoga breathing can be divided into three parts:
1. The abdominal phase (relaxes calms, stimulates digestion, reduces blood pressure, etc.)
2. The thoracic phase (energetic breathing la used in most postures
3. The clavicle phase
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 In yoga, we always breathe through the nose (except in some very special cases) and breathe in three steps: inhalation, exhalation, and air retention.
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2. Postures:
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 In Yoga there are many postures (asanas) that can be adapted to each person's level, from the simplest ones to the more acrobatic types.
Every posture brings all kinds of benefits, both for the body and for the mind: Strengthening, regeneration, purification, development, relaxation.
In order to be able to receive benefits, we have to follow essential rules while practicing these postures:
Taking the right position, with enough time to position every part of the body in the right way.
Breathing in accordance with the posture to be taken.
Relaxing all of the muscles that do not relate with the good execution of the posture.
Calming the mind and concentrating on our breathing.
In Yoga there is no spirit of competition, neither against us nor against others.
A simple and well executed posture will bring as many physical and mental benefits as a more difficult one
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3. Meditation:
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 When we meditate, we neutralize the opposite forces in our mind (positive and negative); "turn off" our senses and find inner peace.
We try to create a mental "vacuum" to be able to put our mind in order, balance it and make it free it of stress.
There is a host of benefits we can obtain through meditation; through it we can control and calm our mind, as well as open it to the Universal, and try to find a path to the truth.
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 * Paramhansa Yogananda (1893-1952): Great yoga master. This world teacher has come to be recognized as one of the greatest emissaries to the West of India's ancient wisdom. His life and teachings continue to be a source of light and inspiration to people of all races, cultures and creeds.
In 1920, Yogananda was invited to serve as India's delegate to an international congress of religious leaders convening in Boston. His address to the congress, on "The Science of Religion," was enthusiastically received. That same year he founded Self-Realization Fellowship to disseminate worldwide his teachings on India's ancient science and philosophy of Yoga and its time-honored tradition of meditation.
For the next several years, he lectured and taught on the East coast and in 1924 embarked on a cross-continental speaking tour. The following year, he established in Los Angeles an international headquarters for Self-Realization Fellowship, which became the spiritual and administrative heart of his growing work.
A pioneer of Yoga in the West: Over the next decade, Yogananda traveled and lectured widely, speaking to capacity audiences in many of the largest auditoriums in the country -- from New York's Carnegie Hall to the Los Angeles Philharmonic
Yogananda emphasized the underlying unity of the world's great religions, and taught universally applicable methods for attaining direct personal experience of God. To serious students of his teachings he introduced the soul-awakening techniques of Kriya Yoga, a sacred spiritual science originating millenniums ago in India, which had been lost in the Dark Ages and revived in modern times by his lineage of enlightened masters.
During the 1930s, Paramahansa Yogananda began to withdraw somewhat from his nationwide public lecturing so as to devote himself to the writings that would carry his message to future generations, and to building an enduring foundation for the spiritual and humanitarian work of Self-Realization Fellowship (known in India as Yogoda Satsanga Society).
Under his direction, the personal guidance and instruction that he had given to students of his classes was arranged into a comprehensive series of Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons for home study.
Yogananda's life story, Autobiography of a Yogi, was published in 1946 and expanded by him in subsequent editions. A perennial best seller, the book has been in continuous publication since it first appeared and has been translated into 18 languages. It is widely regarded as a modern spiritual classic.
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